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Get the boss to buy in13/02/2015

Organisations do not prosper unless managers in the middle ranks identify and promote the need for change. People at this level gain valuable intelligence from direct contact with customers, suppliers, and colleagues.

A recent study conducted by the Harvard Business Review examined what works in organisations. Apparently, middle managers are more likely to speak up when they:

1.Identify with the organisation

2.Have a positive relationship with their audience

3.Feel psychologically safe in the organisation

4.Think someone above them will take action

5.Care enough about the issue to invest energy in selling it

Accomplished middle managers who speak up look for the best ways to voice their ideas and concerns, using rhetorical skill, political sensitivity, and interpersonal connections, to move the right leaders to action. In particular, they use the following seven strategies significantly more often than people who don’t succeed in gaining buy-in.

1: Tailor your pitch

Vital is to familiarise yourself with the audience’s goals, values, and knowledge.

2: Frame the issue

How you package the idea determines its importance and how much of a priority it is. Once people see how your initiative fits into the big picture, they will be more willing to devote resources to it.

3: Manage emotions on both sides

‘Issue’ selling is an interpersonal activity, which inevitably stirs emotions. Research by Wharton University’s Adam Grant shows that people who keep their emotions in check feel more comfortable raising issues and receive higher performance evaluations. It is equally important to understand and manage the decision maker’s emotions.

4: Get the timing right

It is critical to find the right moment to raise your ideas. The best ‘sellers’ notice when more and more people are beginning to care about a larger topic or trend that’s related to their issue, and they position their idea to “catch the wave.”

Be mindful of deadlines. When a deadline is far away and decision makers are still in exploration mode, open-ended inquiry can be more effective than proposing a specific solution.

5: Involve others

Building a coalition generates organisational buy-in more quickly and on a larger scale as more people contribute energy and resources. When building a coalition, reach out to experts in relevant areas to add to your credibility.

6: Adhere to norms

Those who roll out their ideas informally early on in order to gauge interest, and then switch to formal presentations generally see stronger, committed results.

7: Suggest solutions

Proposing a solution signals that the ‘seller’ has put thought into the issue and respects leaders’ time.

Overall, no set of instructions can remove the risks and disappointments of issue selling. But sellers who routinely and effectively use these tactics will enjoy greater success than those who don’t. Issue selling is not a discrete event; it is an ongoing process that requires groundwork, pacing, and patience. When done effectively, ideas get attention and make a real difference.

The art of giving and receiving advice10/02/2015

Seeking and giving advice are both competencies to be mastered. Getting
it wrong can have detrimental consequences, with substantial costs to
individuals and their businesses.

Here are the most common obstacles for when seeking or giving advice, along
with practical guidelines for overcoming them, as discussed in a recent Harvard
Business Review article.

What to avoid when
you’re seeking advice:

Thinking you already have the answers

When people are deciding whether they need help, they often have
difficulty assessing their own competence and place too much faith in their
intuition. The result is overconfidence and a tendency to default to solo
decision making based on prior knowledge and assumptions.

In a study of CEOs, those at companies with poor financial performance were
more likely to seek advice from executives in the same industry. The result was
limited strategic change - less product-market and geographic diversification.

Furthermore, several studies confirm that advice seekers are more
receptive to guidance from friends or family. Though nonthreatening
personalities impart comfort and trust, they have no relation to the quality of
the advice.

Defining the problem poorly

When communicating ineffectively, the seeker may tell a lengthy story
that causes listeners to lose focus. Or they may omit details that reflect
badly on them, or misdefine the problem by placing arbitrary boundaries around
it, which skews the overall assessment.

Discounting advice

A strong, recurrent finding in organisational behaviour research is ‘egocentric
bias’ which often clouds seekers’ vision - they may become so anchored in their
preformed judgments they cannot adjust their thinking when they receive
feedback.

Misjudging the quality of advice

Most seekers who accept advice have difficulty distinguishing the good
from the bad. Research shows that they value advice more if it comes from a
confident source.

What to avoid when
you’re giving advice:

Overstepping boundaries

Though many people give unsolicited advice, it is usually considered
intrusive. People who liberally offer unjustified advice lose credibility and
influence in their organisations.

Misdiagnosing the problem

Advisers must gather intelligence to develop a clearer picture of the
problem to be solved. Taking accounts at face value leads to inaccurate
assessments and flawed advice.

Offering self-centred guidance

Advisers often frame their guidance as “how I would respond if I were in
your shoes.” Advisers may also share personal stories that fail the “doability
test” because they simply don’t fit with the seeker’s situational constraints.

Communicating advice poorly

Providing vague recommendations using jargon or inaccessible language makes
them easily misconstrued. Do not overwhelm seekers with too many ideas: nothing
causes paralysis like a list of options with no explicit guidance.

Mishandling the aftermath

Many advisers take offense when their guidance is not accepted. The
reality is that recipients rarely take one person’s advice and go with it. More
often they modify the advice, combine it with feedback from others, or reject
it altogether - advisers must treat these responses as valuable input in an
ongoing conversation.

Here are the
simplified five stages of advising:

Stage 1: Find the right fit

Stage 2: Develop
a shared understanding

Stage 3:
Craft alternatives

Stage 4:
Converge on a decision

Stage 5:
Put advice into action

Overall, the guidelines for both seekers and advisers demand a
fundamental shift in approach. Although people typically focus on the content
of advice, those who are most skilled concentrate as much on to how they
advise as to what they advise.

The business of being social02/02/2015

Twitter can be a powerful medium for a CEO, however, only 14% of the
chief executives of the world’s largest listed companies are using the social
media platform, notes a recent article in the Financial Times.

Some business leaders worry that Twitter might be a fleeting trend, one
which may be superseded by another social media platform. But, with 284 million
users each month, such concerns are becoming difficult to justify.

A further concern is that leaders will make a mistake, accidentally leak
something about the company, or be misinterpreted and criticised. This is not
unreasonable - many people have lost their jobs because of misguided words on
Twitter and poorly worded tweets by leaders regularly provoke anger.

However, the power of being able to instantly communicate with
potentially thousands of people outweighs most concerns. People are much more
likely to trust a brand if the CEO is actively engaged on social media.

Furthermore, a Twitter presence can also be a valuable recruitment tool,
particularly when hiring younger members of staff.

When young millennials are looking for jobs they tend to look at the
company and the CEO on social media, and executives with a social media
presence appear more forward thinking.

Accoring to Nafisa Nathani, a communications consultant and
self-described ‘millennial’: “No #millennial wants to work for a faceless
corporation. CEOs are the face of a company. Social media helps to
connect.”

For the anxious tweeters, a safe place to start is to tweet about
company events and interesting articles. If executives are concerned about
compliance issues then company lawyer can approve tweets. Two of the most
popular CEOs on Twitter to look at are Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, and Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla Motors. Musk has the most followers, more
than 1.51 million, but Cook gets more engagement.

Tweeting too much about your own company and products is a no-no. “If
you are only talking about your own products or retweeting PR headlines, your
Twitter followers will tune out,” says Bolg, head of marketing at Socialbro. It
is also advisable, if possible, to write your own tweets, it has to be your own
voice or customers will disengage.

Ultimately, CEOs can no longer ignore the influence of Twitter. Gaines-Ross
notes: “It is from a low base, but it is not going away, it is growing and by
2020 it is going to be ubiquitous.”

How to argue productively22/01/2015

The ability to argue well is a life skill. Get it right and it can be an art form, but get it wrong and you risk humiliation. Red-faced rages, shouting and tears are not respected in the office and undermine one’s sense of professionalism and self-worth.

According to a recent article, here are ten tips on how to argue with finesse and ensure you get your point across succinctly:

Be strategic and do your homework

"Before starting an argument think carefully about what it is you are arguing about and what it is you want," says Jonathan Herring, lawyer and author of How To Argue. This may sound obvious. But it is critically important.

Listen up

Start by listening to what the other person has to say and make sure you acknowledge their point of view.

Be open-minded, or at least appear that way

"Becoming defensive is one of the worst ways to win an argument," says psychology professor Susan Krauss Whitbourne. "If you appear to be giving the other side’s position a thoughtful review, then the solution you propose will seem more sensible. Furthermore, your opponent may come to your side without your having to do anything other than listen. By letting your opponent speak, you may allow the situation to naturally resolve itself."

Trust the other person's intent

Even if the person disagrees with you or you feel angry because they hurt your feelings, assume they did not intend to hurt you or make a mistake.

Get comfortable with awkward silences

Stephen Key, author of the One Simple Idea seriessays: "after I explicitly state what it is I want, I clam up. When we’re uncomfortable with an awkward silence, it’s tempting to fill it quickly, but if you do, you might end up saying something without thinking it through. Make your point, be confident and force yourself to wait for a response."

Don’t get emotional - take your time

Exploders might win arguments by sheer brute force but that doesn't last. Only logic lasts, and to be logical you need to be in control of your emotions.

Disagree clearly, using specific examples

Make your position known as soon as you reasonably can. Be simple, to the point, and specific about your concerns.

Attack the problem, not the person

Your points will be heard more clearly if you can depersonalise your comments and point only at the issue.

Bombard your opponent with questions

If you can ask the right questions you can stay in control of the discussion and make your opponent scramble for answers. A useful type of question is one that calmly provokes your opponent, 'what is about this that makes you so angry?'

Use body language to disarm your opponent

"Mirror your adversary," advises US-based communications expert Nick Morgan. Mirroring builds agreement; you can often head off potential trouble by establishing a strong basis of nonverbal agreement before the hard negotiating begins.

Try to adopt a similar seated or standing position to your party. This sends an unconscious message to the person that you are on an equal level and generally in agreement with them. They will then begin to trust you.

Fear for a dystopian future as computers show power to psychoanalyse14/01/2015

A study of more than 86,000 Facebook users has shown the ability of
intelligent machines to predict an individual’s character based on what they
have ‘liked’. David Stillwell of Cambridge, who developed the personality test,
says: ‘we found that the computer can predict personality as accurately as the
person’s spouse, better than a close friend or family member and a whole lot
better than a work colleague’.

86,220
volunteers on Facebook completed a 100 item personality questionnaire and
allowed their likes to be accessed for the Cambridge study. Machine-learning
software analysed the ‘likes’ based on the five main traits usually used in
psychological assessments: openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness,
and neuroticism. The more ‘likes’ the computer could include in its assessment,
the more accurate it became in forming a prediction of a person’s overall
character and personality.

Wu Youyou, the lead author of the study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences, notes: ‘in the future, computers could be able to infer our
psychological traits and react accordingly, leading to the emergence of
emotionally-intelligent and socially-skilled machines. People may choose to
augment their own intuitions and judgements with this kind of data analysis
when making important life decisions such as choosing activities, career paths
or even romantic partners’.

However, this could raise ethical questions about how and when it would
be applied. Stillwell says: ‘the results of such data analysis can be very
useful in aiding people when making decisions but people need to be aware of
it, and companies need to tell us when they are using it’.

Researchers also share the concerns of those fearing a dystopian future,
where our traits and habits become an ‘open book’ for computers to read. Dr
Michal Kosinski, another member of the team, says: ‘we hope that consumers,
technology developers, and policymakers will tackle those challenges by
supporting privacy-protecting laws and technologies, and giving the users full
control over their digital footprints.’

The paradigm shift of influencer marketing07/01/2015

The new wave of online gurus and social media influencers are helping
marketers gain ‘word of mouth at scale’. Many now have more followers than the
circulation of papers and magazines. A recent article in the FT shows how this
trend represents a paradigm shift in how marketers reach consumers today.

Although influencer marketing has not yet become its own category,
Forrester Research estimates the US social media marketing spend will be over
double in the next few years: from $8.2bn last year to $18.7bn in 2019.

Marco Hansell, chief executive of Speakr, an agency that connects social
influencers with brands, says companies want to ‘piggyback’ on the
relationships such influencers build with their followers. ‘A movie studio
doesn’t have a personality, per se. I don’t have a relationship with Universal
Studios. But I do with this guy on YouTube and when he lends his name to
something, or says this is awesome, or creates content around it, I have a
whole different level of interaction.’

Part of the authenticity is
that brands allow influencers to create their own content, instead of handing
them an advertisement to broadcast to their followers. This helps marketers reduce
their budgets with the huge number of campaigns they are expected to run on
social media.

The two biggest challenges are gauging influencers’ impact and deciding
what they disclose about what a brand is paying for the promotion.

Eric Dahan from Instabrand works with influencers. He says it is a ‘new
frontier in traditional ad buying and selling’, where metrics such as
impressions, clicks and key performance indicators that brands are used to
buying against do not work on Vine, Snapchat
and Instagram.
These social media platforms, unlike Facebook and Twitter, are in the early
stages of working out their paid advertising model. They do not provide
detailed data on who sees each image, so marketers have to rely on how many
followers an account has.

Laundry Service, an American social media marketing agency, has created
Cycle: a business managing more than 1,000 top Instagram photographers with large
followings. Cycle’s photographers are paid to share photos with their
followers, as well as to create photos for brands that are used across other
social networks. They must disclose any sponsored campaign they work on. Jason
Stein, Laundry Service president, says brands that use Instagram photos in
their email and Facebook campaigns see higher click through rates, engagement
rates and conversions. Cycle now accounts for 15 per cent of Laundry Service’s
revenue.

Another issue is when influencers include brands in their posts without stating
they have been paid to promote them. Recently, the advertising watchdog criticised popular
YouTube stars for promoting Oreos without disclosing they had
struck a deal with Mondelez, the global snack group that owns the biscuit
brand. Not disclosing paid promotion is detrimental to the brand.

A few examples of social media influencers who work with brands:

Sam Ciurdar - Photographer

Ciurdar’s Instagram is full of pictures of his adventures. On a trip to
Canada, the professional freelance photographer took some pictures that led to
him becoming a social media influencer for Tim Horton’s coffee.

Horton saw that Ciurdar’s snaps of the Canadian coffee were popular with
his 35,000 followers so signed a deal with him to promote them officially.

Ciurdar thinks brands are smart in the way they approach influencers,
asking them to be creative in a way that matches their other posts on a given
platform.

Michael Platco - Snapchat artist

Platco has created a business out of being a specialist in Snapchat, the
disappearing messaging app that has soared in popularity with teenagers. He has
his own account but often takes over the accounts of brands such as Disney to
send out amusing snaps, which he enlivens with colourful sketches.

So far, Snapchat has not made it easy for influencers and marketers. It
is hard to measure who a ‘snap’ has reached and they are almost impossible for
a recipient to send on.

‘Snapchat in every way is different than Instagram and YouTube and Vine’,
he says. ‘It is such a different platform that it calls for a whole different
playbook.’ He adds he is cautious with brands he chooses to represent. ‘I need
to be cool with that brand. I’ve turned down a good amount of work because I
thought anything I did with this brand would be spammy’, he says.

Brent Rivera - Teen vlogger

Rivera, created a series of posts for the teen-focused retailer
Hollister. The teenager made his first brand deal last year and devotes hours a
day to his social media presence. He entrusts the deal making to his manager. ‘[My
manager] is really good with social media, he knows CPM [cost per mille, an
advertising measure] and what other people are charging for an Instagram post
or tweet and for which companies’, he explains. ‘It depends on engagement, so I
have pretty high engagement, which means I get a lot of likes.’